A little explanation on domain squatting is required. You might have heard of some cases in the news of domain squatters getting into trouble by registering a trademarked domain, or the name of someone famous. Domain squatting is exactly that. WIPO stands for World Intellectual Property Organization, the UN body that judges on intellectual property rights. WIPO rulings are made when the panel makes judgments based on complaints received.

In this case, it is very obvious that the name CarlosSlimHelu.com referred to none other than the man himself. But what is hilarious is the squatter’s own arguments trying to justify that his domain registration wasn’t done in bad faith. The guy demanded $55,000,000 from Mr Slim to get the domain back, and when he didn’t get a response, redirected the name to a porn site to “get his attention.” It goes without saying what happened afterwards was a no brainer. Read all the details in the ruling here.

One of the reasons the domain industry is getting a bad reputation is due to such domain squatters. In the above case, it’s obviously written with “bad faith” all over it. Reading the story did give me a good laugh, though.

For me, a domain name is a piece of cyber-estate that gives me a presence on the Web, and I’ve written about domains at various times, like how to choose a good domain name, or why .com is best. You can either register a domain name or you can buy it from someone, but one thing’s for sure – there’s a right way, and a wrong way to go about it.

It seemed there would be no stopping ICANN from going ahead with this decision, as it seems it has been ICANN’s plan all along from the very start of its inception, to open up the Web to all kinds of TLD extensions. But, as I remarked in my previous post regarding this, all I can see is the dilution of the existing TLDs, and it may even impact the old and venerable extension, .COM down the road.

It will not be now, it will not be next year (when the first extensions under this plan are expected to be announced), and it probably won’t happen for the next few years, but the impact will be felt when a new generation of Web users who have not been steeped in the .com tradition, and see nothing wrong with any domain extension fill in and replace the current base of Web users (who “grew up” with .com).

Although there are people who still insist that .com will not be affected, and they base that assumption on the past performance of .info/.biz (which has not yet gained a large public mindshare even after years of existence), no one in their right mind would still hold fast to the notion of .com being the king of TLDs forever.

The big loser would be the domain industry in general. I still believe this will affect the domain industry, because it will slowly lead to devaluation of many extensions, especially those that are not so well known. Hard hit would probably be .mobi and to think that not too long ago, premium .mobi domains were pretty pricey. Compare that with a .com like Wine.com which sold for nearly $3 million and make your predictions on how much it would be worth a few years from now, especially if a rival extension like .wine were to come into existence. Will the current owners of premium .com band together and fight any new rival extensions? A storm is brewing.

Some jest that investing in TLDs is going to be the next trend. Would there be a mad scramble for TLDs instead of domain names in future? Not that it would come cheap, since the price to form just one extension for a (popular) keyword could even end up being $1 million or more if it goes into an auction process. The major beneficiary to an influx of domain extensions would of course be ICANN, who stands to gain a great deal for every new TLD approved. And the gatekeepers would be the search engines, who can determine if a new TLD is worth giving a rank or not. Would Google still give priority to the established extensions? It won’t be wrong to think even Google will face major headaches in future, no thanks to ICANN.

Maybe I’m wrong, but just like people have largely rejected Windows Vista in favor of the old Windows XP, to the point of even influencing Microsoft’s plans, so end user trends will determine the future of ICANN’s decision, and whether the decision was wrong or right.

What exactly this means, is that anyone with enough money and backing, can essentially register his own TLD and with that, you don’t just have .com/net/org/biz/info and so forth, but you are looking at unlimited TLD extensions. Anyone with $39,000 to $390,000 and enough backing can propose and create (almost) any domain name extension, it seems.

For example, we may have a .laptop extension created. So that means if you want a domain called www.MySite.laptop and it’s available, you can register it. Same goes for any extension that gets created and approved. In fact, some cities are lobbying for this, and planning on having their own “city” extension.

If my understanding is correct, this is going to result in many changes both good and bad. On the one hand, it means anyone can have any domain they like, but on the other hand, it results in a whole host of side effects which don’t look good to me. Here are my observations, though I might be wrong. Let’s take a look.

Firstly, this flood might spawn confusion and lower the overall perceived value of the Web among the public. Nothing is going to stick in the mind, simply because sites will get watered down in the public mind, and therefore, sites will find the going tough in order to differentiate themselves from each other. To state it simply, this will hurt repeat visitor value for everyone except the big dogs (the big Internet companies). I’m know I’m going to find it hard to remember what site I last visited, simply because there will be hundreds of extensions out there (and similar names). Since it will be so tough to weed through the morass of extensions (often with the same name, but different extension), surfers will soon find themselves even more dependent than ever on the search engines, and no guesses on who are the big winners here.

Secondly, this will lead to increased SEO competition many, many times more than what it is now, among websites and blogs. Many websites could pretty much fold up from the pressure. This sort of environment on the Web will make it more of an unforgiving jungle than what it already is. This could also spawn record level demand for blackhat SEO tactics due to the demanding environment, and phishing and trademark disputes on X number of domains will also increase manifold. How is this going to be for the average blogger or webmaster with limited resources? Let’s think ahead a little.

Thirdly, mass influx of new extensions may well be the death knell for the domain industry. The only domains worth any value will be some super, duper, popular, generic names, and even then, their value may decline. I’m not sure if this will end up strengthening the .com extension or diluting it; only time will tell, but nonetheless it could spell the end for the domaining industry because when you have hundreds or even thousands of extensions – supply will greatly exceed demand, and you get lots of new “premiums” which turn out to be not so “premium” after all. Johnny has a rare name, but hey, so does Bob over there, albeit with a different extension. Oops…. Domaining won’t be a viable industry anymore if domain values drop like ripe figs, and there will be many domainers who sank lots of money in domains, unable to recover them. Will it turn out this way?

Right now, there are 20 gTLDs and under 250 ccTLDs in existence, and I think the Web is coping just fine. But the question is how the addition of hundreds or thousands of new extensions would do to the current state of affairs. Whatever the outcome of ICANN’s proposals, it only goes to underline the ever changing nature of the Internet. There are speculations we could even be surfing from paid channels five years from now! Once again, the Web keeps changing (and will continue to change). Brace yourselves for the ride ahead, guys.

The .me extension is the ccTLD of Montenegro, an ex Serbian republic. Registration is open worldwide, and the Landrush phase is scheduled to end on 26 June 2008. The earlier Sunrise period just ended on May 20. Just like .Asia domains, any multiple registrations during the Landrush period will go into auction. But after June 26, it will all be on a first-come-first-serve basis, starting July 17, 2008.

What I like about .me is obviously the ability to create cool domain hacks with it. A lot of people may think it is only good for porn domains, but I digress. There are many cool possibilities with .me. Unfortunately, the premium domain names that could be registered with .me have all virtually been reserved or designated as premium. The high price is also not helping their cause, but it does go some way in weeding out some opportunistic registrants. Currently in this landrush phase, it costs $50 to register a .me for a year, and they need a minimum of 2 years registration. Right now, there are a few registrars offering .me registration, one of which is Godaddy, which appears to have secured registrar rights for the extension.

All things said, this is still a very “hackable” domain extension. If you can’t get a cool .me, fret not though. There are other extensions and other hacks. For example, the .us extension is still largely untapped, but undeniably, has good “hacking” potential too, being sheltered in part by its restriction for registration only by US based entities.

There are also many other ccTLDs that can conceivably be hacked to form great names; a list of ccTLDs can be found right on Wikipedia. Just remember to check the terms of registration, because different ccTLDs have different terms of service, and it also takes a lot of effort to make a domain hack website popular in the long run. In addition, it is still unknown how the major search engines will treat new or obscure ccTLDs. Nevertheless, for many of you domain aficionados out there, a domain hack is a cool thing to have!

So with Pool.com being chosen as the auction organizer, I think things will be getting dirty with some of these highly coveted and contested generic domains. I expect the final auction prices on some of these to reach high figures, and glad I’m just a curious onlooker right now

I think there are several reasons for the frenzy. It’s pure speculation. It’s gambling. Most buyers willing to pay large sums of money are probably end users running short on ideas on how to spend their money. Owning a nice .Asia domain seems to have become a hobby for them. Check out the auction ticker page here when the auctions actually get going…

My take

I don’t think .Asia has what it takes to be used for anything other than on topics related to Asia, travel, entertainment, or celeb names. And the domain has to be generic enough to be of any present value. It should take off a whole lot more than .EU, because of the large potential user base in Asia, but seriously, I don’t foresee .Asia taking over major sections of the Web in Asia.

Still, I’m waiting for the Asia Go Live phase to commence, when some normalcy should have been restored by then. When the Go Live phase goes into effect, all available domains in .Asia will be placed on a normal “first come, first served” basis, just like the case with other TLDs and registrars elsewhere.

If you had asked me last year if .Asia stood any chance, I would have said “No.”

Firstly, a couple of explanations. Some may wonder what is a Landrush or a Sunrise? These are domain industry specific terms. “Landrush” denotes the “first come, first served” basis, and is the period when a TLD is first open to the public, while “Sunrise” is a pre-order period to ensure corporations got adequate chance to register their trademark domains before registration is open to the public. It is now an acceptable way to help reserve domain names for corporations.

The Landrush period now on, will end on March 12, and will be followed by the normal Go Live period from March 26 onwards. Before this current Landrush, there were several Sunrise periods that have now passed, ever since .Asia was approved back in October 2006. All governments and companies have been given adequate time by now to secure all their trademarks.

Why would you want a .Asia domain?

The good news

Now that the Landrush phase is on, anyone in the world can register a .Asia domain as long as they have one contact in the Asian region. Unlike other ccTLDs like .US and .EU, the .Asia extension is actually a gTLD, with less restrictions than normal country level TLDs.

What seems new in this case, is that .Asia allows for two or more applicants registering the same name to compete against each other in an auction. This is probably a much fairer way of awarding domains, and this policy could apply for other new extensions in future. By the way, this “two or more applicants” rule will only apply during the Landrush phase. Once it is over on March 12, any domains not contested will belong to the sole registrant. Fair enough.

The not so good news

Asia is so vast and diverse, that many Asians identify themselves more with their countries than with the general term “Asia.” There are about 70 countries classified as “Asian,” stretching from Saudi Arabia to Australia, and making up about 60% of the world’s population. Asia might be too broad a term.

Unlike .EU which is a more unified term, I don’t expect demand for .Asia to be hot among Asians themselves, probably not in a while. A more popular extension currently is .IN, which is the country level TLD for India.